What has preclinical systematic review ever done for us?

Systematic review and meta-analysis are a gift to the modern researcher, delivering a crystallised understanding of the existing research data in any given space. This can include whether candidate drugs are likely to work or not and which are better than others, whether our models of disease have predictive value and how this might be improved and also how these all interact with disease pathophysiology. Grappling with the literature needed for such analyses is becoming increasingly difficult as the number of publications grows.